


Worth Fighting For

by Faylette



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Baby Keith (Voltron), Childbirth, F/M, Family Feels, Guys they just love each other so much, Hurt/Comfort, Krolia is a tough-as-nails badass, POV Second Person, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 06:27:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14971037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Faylette/pseuds/Faylette
Summary: A little story about Keith coming into the world, surrounded by love.





	Worth Fighting For

**Author's Note:**

> Me: I'm so in love with Krolia and Texas Kogane's love for each other and for little baby Keith, I just HAVE to write something about it.  
> Also me: Make a semi-graphic portrayal of Keith's birth and put in the second person so you don't have to give Texas a real name.  
> Me: hey sounds good
> 
> If you enjoy, I'd love to hear from you! Because I'm just over in a corner screaming about these two after season 6 and I think I can be easily prodded into writing more about them.

             “I can handle pain,” Krolia told you, almost proudly, with a tinge of the all-too-real reality behind it, and you had no reason to doubt her. But still, you worried.

             “I can handle it!” she tells you now through gritted teeth, swatting your hand back when you go to move the hair away from her sweat-soaked forehead. Still, you don’t doubt her. And still, you worry.

             When she looks over at you, slouched in the chair you dragged to the bedside, you must not be hiding that sliver of hurt you’re feeling all that well, because the pain and frustration in her face morphs right away into a regretful guilt.

             “I am sorry,” she says, softer now, turning her eyes away.

             “Nah.” You shake your head. “Don’t worry about it.”

             “I expected it to hurt,” Krolia sighs, running her palm over the curve of her belly. “I did not think it would hurt so mu—”

             With a heavy groan, she lunges away from the headboard to double over in pain, the gentle hand on her stomach seizing up into a desperate grip. You reach to rub her back, whispering gentle, encouraging nothings as she huffs and cries and spits out curses, some familiar, most alien to your ears. They don’t startle you, but they do paint a picture of how bad this is for Krolia; in the time you’ve known her, she hasn’t been big on swearing. Not at all.

             Krolia grows quieter as the pain passes, but her face remains marked with the intensity of it. This is all taking a toll on you, but you know what you’re going through can’t compare to her trials. Krolia’s drained. Exhausted. It’s been hours upon hours, with no good way to tell if there’s any relief in sight.

             “They’re gettin’ real close together now,” you offer. “That means progress, right?”

             “It had better.” She lies back down, letting her head sink into the pillow, strands of purple and pink standing out all the more against the white fabric of the pillowcase. “The women who choose to do this without drugs, without healers — are they insane?”

             Maybe, maybe not. Whatever their reasons for forgoing what modern medicine has to offer, you’re pretty sure you can safely bet that none of those reasons are the ones Krolia has. Because, _damn_ , those marvels of modern medicine sound mighty nice right about now.

             Obviously, you’re no doctor, and there’s only so much you can know, so much you can find out on your own. And Krolia will openly admit that her knowledge on this subject is cursory, at best, having never expected to need such knowledge. But from the day Krolia voiced her suspicions to you, and even more so after those suspicions were rather squarely backed up by a growing belly, you’ve dedicated countless hours to absorbing every infinitesimal detail about pregnancy and childbirth that you could find. As such, over the months, you’ve gathered as many sources of information as you could, bringing books for uncertain expecting parents and medical professionals in training alike back home for the both of you to study. But none of those books could account for, and reasonably so, the mother in question not being human. It creates so many questions that can’t be answered. Does the ubiquitous recommendation of folate supplements apply to a Galra pregnancy, for example? Would any kind of pain relief drugs, even if you had the access to them and the confidence in administering them, do more harm than good?

             And besides, you don’t have any tools at your disposal, or the know-how to use them. It wasn’t like you could just take your towering, fuzzy, _purple-skinned_ mother-to-be of your human-alien hybrid child to a medical centre for any kind of prenatal care, much less the birth itself. You don’t know if you’re having a boy or girl, heck, you don’t even know if this kid’s gonna come out purple and pointy-eared. But, really, that stuff doesn’t matter much; it’d be much better to know if Krolia and the baby were safe, or if something went wrong...

             “I am not used to this,” says Krolia, her tone one of admitting something she should not. “It is... difficult.”

             “I’d reckon so.” You give her a sympathetic nod. “Having babies ain’t easy. I’ve never heard otherwise.”

             “Not that. Being helped, being...” she pauses, a crinkle in her brow forming as she searches for the word, “... vulnerable. Weak.”

             She is independent, by necessity if not by nature. You’ve heard about her infiltration missions, where she has no one to rely on but herself, and how she’s had to set her own broken bones and cauterize her own wounds. She’s one damn powerful woman. And that’s no different right now.

             “You ain’t weak, Krolia,” you insist, every earnest ounce of you falling naturally into your words, not just because of how much you believe them, but how much you want _her_ to believe them. “You’re strong. You’re so strong.”

             Krolia grimaces. “That’s not how I feel right now.”

             “Maybe not. But it’s what you are,” you say, bringing your hand up to brush her hair out from her face. She doesn’t jolt away this time, instead leaning into your palm after your fingers slip down to cheek, tracing the mark on her skin. “Trust me. Nothing weak about being in pain. Nothing weak about making life.”

             She makes a little noise, not wholly convinced, but not wholly opposed either.

             “And, well, you don’t have to be stubborn as an ox right now.” You feel yourself grinning despite yourself. “As much as it’s one of your biggest charms.”

             She doesn’t quite smile, but it’s close enough that you think you got your point across. You hold an open hand out in front of her. After a few hesitant seconds, she takes it. She squeezes it tight when the next contraction hits her, and you squeeze back firmly until the pain subsides. You repeat this again, again, and again. You don’t even think of complaining when she starts crushing your hand so hard in hers you think she might break it.

             And, hey, you know she’s totally capable of it.

 

             It’s hours still before Krolia, tired beyond measure, pushed past her limits, reaches between her thighs and gasps. With a jolt of alarm, you rush to see what’s wrong. It’s an odd mix of relief and heart-pumping adrenaline when you find what you’ve seen depicted in countless diagrams and photos and medical training videos, so many times that you thought yourself unaffected by it. But it’s different in the moment, different when it’s your kid.

             “You’re crowning, hun,” you say, awe-struck, frozen in place, and exceptionally useless.

             “I _know_!” Krolia groans, her eyes squeezed shut in agony and her hand squeezed around yours, as another contraction comes barrelling in.

             You wait it out, not that there’s any force in the universe that could pry you free from her grip, until the lull sets in.

             “I’m gonna wash up, okay, darlin’?” you tell her, mustering up the best soothing voice you can when everything seems like it’s going a mile a minute. “Just a minute, promise.”

             She gives you a couple stiff, wordless nods, and you give her a quick kiss on her temple before you hurry off to the sink. As much as you just want to get back to Krolia’s side, you try to focus on cleaning up your hands thoroughly, scrubbing every inch vigorously, from your nails to near halfway up your forearms, slipping on a pair of the blue latex gloves you had ready once you’ve dried off.

             You come back to Krolia wailing and panting, hissing out more words you don’t use in the presence of polite company, her nails clawing (literally) into the pillow behind her head, and you wouldn’t be surprised if she ends up ripping it apart.

             “I’m here,” you tell her, settling down on your knees near the bottom of the bed. “I got you — I got both of you.”

             She acknowledges it with a throaty hum. With your gloved hand, you take a gentle, anticipatory hold of the baby’s head, covered in a mantle of messy, wet black hair.

             “Have you been pushing?” you ask.

             “Yes,” she says, strained, with a nod.

             “Good, good. Keep it up.”

             “I’m fucking _trying!_ ” she yells, her words turning to a raw scream that doesn’t let up until, in what seems like an instant, you have a whole head in your hand. Krolia throws her head back, panting raggedly for relief.

             “Almost there, hun,” you say. “Take a breather. Just got the shoulders next.”

             She tries, with difficulty, to even out her breathing, to follow what little advice you can give her in her time of need. In the space between pushes, you get your first decent look at your firstborn — first-in-the-process-of-being-born, you guess — with a head full of human-looking hair and a squished, grumpy-looking human face, no trace of alien to be seen. Well, besides the regular, alien-ish way newborn humans just _always_ look.

             It’s a welcome relief, in a way. The world can be a much bigger place for a kid who’s not purple. But you shrug the thought aside; you got more important stuff to deal with right now.

             Then, when the moment finally comes, two pairs of hands catch the boy’s floppy little body (a boy! You have a son!) and work fast together to bring him up to the warmth of his mother’s chest. Then, as Krolia’s pained cries subside into heavy gulps of air, it is quiet. It is far too quiet.

             You hear your name in the shakiest, most gut-wrenching voice you can imagine, a plea for help among a dire silence.

             “C’mon, c’mon,” you chant mindlessly, desperately, like a prayer, rubbing his back to try and encourage him out of what you hope with every ounce of hope in your body and more is just a passing stupor. “C’mon, kiddo, don’t scare us like that. It’s awful impolite of you.”

             It’s like a knife plunging into your heart, this fear, this worst outcome that you keep denying.

             Until you don’t have to deny it anymore.

             The baby jerks his whole body as if startled by a loud noise, then provides such a noise himself: a spluttery bawling that quickly turns into an energetic cry. It’s the most beautiful sound you’ve ever heard, and that overwhelming, joyful relief on Krolia’s face as the little guy makes all that ruckus, well, that’s by far the most beatiful sight you’ve ever seen.

             “He’s so tiny,” she says, nudging at one of his little fists with her finger. “I... he’s really here...” She trails off, her voice wavering like she’s asking a question, to confirm that this is all real.

             “He’s here. ‘Cause of you,” you tell her, with nothing but sheer admiration for this woman, for all she did and endured. “You fought damn good, mama.”

             She raises her eyes to you, weary and shiny with moisture, but wide in realization of what you called her. You catch a smile on her face before her features all crinkle up, and she leans to try and hide behind the baby’s head. Her shoulders tremble and heave, but her arms remain steady with what they hold in them.

             Trying to blink away the blurriness in your own eyes, you return to her side, wrapping one arm around her shoulder, keeping a hand on your still-hollering newborn son, holding close to you the two greatest treasures in your life.

            

             The cute little guy looks even cuter once he’s been cleaned off, calmed down, and fed. He’s still without a name, for now. You like Keith, but you can leave it for later; something as monumental as you two figuring out the name that he’ll carry for his whole life, the name that will be his and _him_ , seems like it’d disrupt this tranquil moment. Your infant son, whatever his name will be, is currently dozing on Krolia’s chest, cradled securely in her arms. Krolia, her thumb gingerly smoothing his soft black hair, looks just as ready to doze off with him but, stubborn as she is, she refuses to. You can tell she can’t stand the thought of a moment away from this little boy, even in sleep.

             “Thank you,” she whispers, barely loud enough for you to hear, quiet enough to avoid disturbing the baby’s slumber.

             In an equally gentle voice, with a raised brow, you respond, “What for?”

             She looks down lovingly at your child, all swaddled up in his little red blanket. “I’ve always known the universe was worth fighting for, but I could never put into words the reason why.” She pauses, a little hitch in her voice as she smiles, eyes on you, and continues, “I can now. You gave me those words.”

             The kiss you share is simple and soft, a delicate little thing that seems so at odds with the woman you share it with. You can’t begin to fathom how lucky you are to experience both her steel and her softness, how lucky you are to have had your lives entwined like this, how lucky you are that of all the places she could have ended up falling out of the sky, she ended up in your dusty patch of the middle of nowhere.

             How lucky your son is to have this extraordinary woman for a mother.

             When the kiss breaks, the gentle weight of it still on your lips, both of you turn your attention back to the boy. Krolia takes his little hand into hers, making it look littler still, and presses her lips to his tiny knuckles, soft as a passing breeze.

             “My son,” says Krolia, her voice even and clear, but still quiet, hand still in hand, “I will protect you. Whatever the cost.” She smiles, a bittersweetness in it. “Always. I swear it.”

             The baby yawns, blissfully oblivious to the gravity of his mama’s oath. You wish you could be too, unburdened by the knowledge of the stirrings in the galaxy, the dark things that lurk in the depths of an endless space, the things that could threaten the peace the three of you now hold onto.

             You cannot forget these things. But, for now, in this sweet, perfect moment, you let yourself forget them.


End file.
